What are Sounding Rockets? They are smaller, unmanned, suborbital launch vehicles that are used to conduct experiments in Earth’s far-upper atmosphere, between the area of orbital satellites down to the Karman line (the commonly accepted boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and outer space at around 62 miles above the Earth’s sea level). It also covers the area between the max altitude of high-atmosphere weather balloons and the Karman line.
Sounding rockets accomplish many useful purposes that larger rockets are too big and/or too expensive to conduct. They serve as upper-air weather detection probes, they prove out critical avionics units intended for larger rockets and/or satellites, and conduct a large amount of other useful experiments for educational institutions and laboratories.
This diagram shows a list of sounding rockets used (for example) by NASA. Typically, these are launched from NASA’s Wallops Center but they are small enough to be launched from anywhere.
The most well-known sounding rocket in NASA’s fleet is the Canadian-designed Black Brant series, build by Bristol Aerospace. The Canadian Space Agency also uses them for similar purposes and goals.
This diagram shows the various configurations of the current Black Brant rockets. The Black Brant is shown in color, with the uncolored parts showing extra stages used for different mission profiles, addressing the weight of the scientific payload and where and/or how far into sub-orbit the vehicle is to travel.
This is a Black Brant launching from NASA Wallops with a Talos first stage, and Taurus second stage. This is the largest configuration for this version of the Black Brant.
For many years, Sounding Rockets have been the brain-child and production of larger companies. But greater knowledge of launch vehicles have made it easier for others not so corporately-inclined to do the same thing. Copenhagen Suborbitals, a small engineering firm made up of many volunteer engineers, designed and launched the first self-guided amateur rocket in 2011. Called the Sapphire, it helped to make Sounding Rocket design and production much more accessible to individuals and small groups versus more-established corporate firms.
This information sheet goes into further details of the systems onboard the Sapphire. Since the launch of Sapphire, Copenhagen Suborbitals has expanded to at least one new Sounding rocket launch vehicle in their roster.
There are other examples of companies and individuals that contribute heavily to the design and flight of Sounding Rockets. As technology increases, you will find more engineers and scientists jumping at the opportunity to build these magnificent craft and tailor them to their specific scientific needs.
For The Great Galactic Space Gimmick, I’m Gimmick Commander Ben Faltinowski! 🙂
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